BCrisis420
Aha, Not my problem!
Been exhausted from work, so I haven't been as active. Vacation starts the 19th. Can't wait to come back and catch up on what's been going on here. Thanks for the tag, very much appreciated!
Lighting Welcome to the AFN DIY LED Building Forum!
Man happy this is here. I am very happy with my modified Mars 300's with 72 volt 3590's in 3500 k they are working amazing and have grown a couple of monsters already including 9.75 ounce bubbleicious that tested at 19.7 thc content..
I will not say one is better then another cause they all work.. I will say that it is truely rewarding building or modifying something and having it work and in my case it exceeded my expectations..
Ripper
I will not say one is better then another cause they all work.. I will say that it is truely rewarding building or modifying something and having it work and in my case it exceeded my expectations..
Ripper
I'm going to be getting the Cree 3590's as well I have a hydrogrow sol 4 that the cobs burned out that I'm gonna use parts from I have 8 drivers and 4 heatsinks this is going to be my frirst build of this type so this should be interestingThis will Rock :smoking:
Brother @A-Train has inspired me to get a few CREE 3590 CBX (72v) COBs, and I'm going to take some old panel carcasses and make a pair of 2x3590 panels. I have 8 drivers from some retired Mars panels, and once I have the specs for a proper heatsink for the build, I will put up a build thread, here, to show what I did, and how much it cost
Meanwell are supposed to be the better ones and they have all different sizes.. Dimming is the way to go has to be a dimable drive then add a potentiometer
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Hey guys, not sure if this was mentioned yet (and we'll do up an official announcement,) but we've actually got Northern Grow Lights @PhotonLabs coming on board for our Live Vendor trial, and they've agreed to sponsor five build kits for our CannaZone test team. The team is going to do a step-by-step tutorial with pictures showing you how they assembled the lights, and then they will do a grow and show with them. We'll have a parts lists for each build and I'm sure Northern Grow Lights would be more than happy to make recommendations and answer questions in their vendor forum as well as the test team on their builds!
Our first AFN COB Building Workshop! We'll have more information soon!
Our first AFN COB Building Workshop! We'll have more information soon!
i'm not an electrical dude but i've done some research on this. long answer is:
that would really depend on both the version of the cob (36v/72v) and how much power you were looking to get. generally speaking, when you're building a light like this, whether or not you use meanwell (there are other good manufacturers, but meanwell has really good fitting drivers for cree cobs), you generally want to use a constant current driver. what this means is that it always puts out the same current, but the voltage is a range, it's flexible. some drivers are the other way around. the reason we want constant current/variable voltage is that it's recommended to run cobs in series, for safety.
so the first thing you want to do is make sure that your series fits. what you're looking for in a driver is an output voltage that is lower at minimum and higher at maximum than your series. so for two 72v cobs you would need, at the very least, a driver that can supply a maximum of 144v (142-144 really, depending on the current). it could also have a higher max output voltage, except if the minimum is 145v and over. so basically, you want a lower minimum and a higher maximum forward voltage on your driver than the sum of your cobs forward voltages (the data for any driver/cob will have that information). that will guarantee that a driver will run the cobs.
the other thing you want to consider is the driver's current (amps or mah). let's keep using the 72v cobs as examples. like we said, we're looking at constant current drivers. let's say a driver puts out 1400 mah, or 1.4 amps. you multiply that by the cobs voltage to get the wattage. so a 72v cob running at 1400mah would pull 100w at the wall (72*1.4=100.8). at 1050mah it would take 75w (72*1.05).
the harder you run it (more current pulling more watts from the wall) the less efficient a cob becomes - it converts less energy into light and more into heat. that's where your discretion (and budget) come into play. a 3590 running at 100w will give less light per watt than one running at 50w, but it will give you more overall light. so the answer would really depend on how you wanted to run it - more efficient or harder. note that harder run cobs will need bigger, heavier and more expensive heatsinks.
the short answer would be any of the meanwell constant current drivers that match the guidelines above. if you're in the states (or another country with 110v system) that means the hlg-***h-c**** series. an hlg-120h-c1050 could run two 72v 3590s at 150w; an hlg-185h-c1400 could run them at 200w. double the current (where possible; they don't make a 2.8 driver, i don't think) for 36v cobs.
edit: as for dimming, the meanwell models come in an A or B version (also a few others, but let's stick with these). the B series is dimmable with a potentiometer (you have to install it seperately). the A series comes with a built in potentiometer, but it only goes down to 50% and it's in the driver itself, so may not be as easily accessible.
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Thanks @FreeSombrero! I need more coffee.
I converted a MH 300 with two 3590, 72v but would like to have more control over moving additional cobs. I bought from northern and will again. I have two of the passive 120 sinks from them because i was already paying shipping and i had the cash.
Yes, 2 more 72v cobs and I want to run them in a manner best for the plants but not so hard that i burn them out in 3 months either. I dont intend to have more than 2 or 3 plants maximum.
It just got real confusing looking at drivers.
I converted a MH 300 with two 3590, 72v but would like to have more control over moving additional cobs. I bought from northern and will again. I have two of the passive 120 sinks from them because i was already paying shipping and i had the cash.
Yes, 2 more 72v cobs and I want to run them in a manner best for the plants but not so hard that i burn them out in 3 months either. I dont intend to have more than 2 or 3 plants maximum.
It just got real confusing looking at drivers.
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